Spellshift

by Allen Snell

  She didn’t appear to care. Aethis sat relaxed on her golden throne, even after it had been dropped to the mud. She wore a black dress with a long slit up the side and a neckline that plunged much deeper than the robe before. Her hair was still an intricate braid of vines. And while her skin was gold, her neck had a much different texture. A pattern of scales shimmered playfully in the sun. Beneath it, the low-cut dress flaunted her ample chest, even more so than Garen remembered. The mixture of hatred and involuntary enticement disoriented him. He stared, and she smirked.

  “I was on my way to you, but I’m glad to see you couldn’t wait,” she said.

  “How did you convince Drake to help you?” Garen shouted.

  She rolled her eyes, “It’s my secret spell that turns noble men into war-hungry lunatics. Watch out, you’re next.” She brought her hands up from her side and stretched them toward him. Garen rolled to the side, no hesitation in his movement. As he put his feet back under him, he heard her laugh. She twirled her fingers in mockery of the magic that didn’t exist. Hatred eclipsed his enticement.

  Garen sprang forward. He sliced at her side. She bent the arm of the golden sedan chair to block it. Garen steadied his hands from the reverberation that rang through him and thrust this time. Aethis cartwheeled out of her seat.

  If he could stay close enough, he wouldn’t need magic to kill. She parried his katana down with a dagger. Garen pressured her with an upward cut. Aethis pulled a second dagger from alongside her thigh to deflect it. She had no chance of striking him while backpedaling, but Garen couldn’t seem to outmaneuver her, either. Not without magic.

  Garen had seen Aethis dismiss all forms of conjured elements, but he hadn’t seen her unmake the natural earth around them. He wished he would’ve had the presence of mind to notice that in Kartik. Still, he was grateful for the last four days of rest and the clarity it gave him.

  Garen shifted the ground beneath them as they fought. Aethis stepped more cautiously, her retreating steps slow and obvious. He hastened his blows, trying to catch her off guard in the ripples that pulsed along the ground. She made no attempt to stop them, confirming Garen’s guess.

  Aethis was becoming less of a threat by the second. Unfortunately, more Apatten were headed their way. He couldn’t afford distractions while he was this close to stopping her. She was the only authority in this war he was even allowed to kill. He needed another moment to trip her up. Garen could see the Apatten’s movement from the corner of his eye. Without looking, he unleashed a wall of flame to hold them back. Aethis didn’t need to look either to banish it from existence.

  The first Apatten struck and put Garen on the defensive. The second forced him to spin away and let Aethis retreat. The third and fourth required him to run as well. Garen pushed himself off the ground with a burst of wind, soaring out of the reach of their blades. Another twenty headed straight for him. Earlier, Garen had imagined his troubles if every Apatten ignored him and charged the city. It became somewhat more complicated when they swarmed him instead.

  Garen formed a disc of wind under his feet to carry him back toward Kalyx. Aethis feigned a melodramatic pout as he floated away. She could have stopped his escape, and yet she didn’t. Curse that woman. He couldn’t fight Drake with Aethis around. He couldn’t fight Aethis surrounded by her army. And fighting eight thousand of anything was strictly impossible. His inability to help was infuriating.

  At least the city walls were holding. He’d seen Kalyx mages repair the gaps almost as fast as Drake had torn them down. The patched segments were short and plain compared to the carved and colored stones they connected. For as long as these guards had the depth, they could keep the Apatten at the walls. Every minute the creatures stayed trapped outside let the crossbowman put down another hundred. Garen barely dodged a stray bolt on his way back inside the city. They fired rapidly into the swarm below him.

  Garen filtered in light from the skies above Kalyx until he found Drake again. He was on the opposite side of the city, still dismantling the wall beneath him. Garen needed to do something quick. The mages might be able to rebuild the wall, but crossbowmen along the ridge weren’t coming back up with the stones. Garen shifted across the city as quickly as he could.

  The Apatten beneath Drake climbed through a new breach. The ground forces were ready to fight them back with flame. None of the Apatten could break through, but they did keep the mages busy bathing them in fire instead of rebuilding the wall. With fewer crossbow bolts to deal with, Drake circled back in the sky to the point of conflict. Cracks burst from the edge of the still-standing wall like bolts of lightning. More soldiers fell to their deaths. Chunks of stone the size of houses fell on both sides. The gap widened.

  The Apatten spread wide as they climbed over the rubble. Garen didn’t expect them to be as nimble as they were proving to be. They closed the distance with unsettling agility. The guards spread wider to keep them contained. Spells that engulfed three or four a moment ago were necessary on each one now. Even if their depth held, which it wouldn’t, the tides would turn quickly, and the border would be overrun. Garen closed the last of the distance in a succession of six borderline-reckless light-shifts.

  Garen’s feet hit solid ground. The breach was even more massive up close. The stones were bigger than him, and the gap was worse than the river. He knew this was the most vulnerable point in the city right now, but he still wasn’t sure what help he could provide. A more confident voice echoed above the cries of war.

  “Ignore the stragglers and get this wall up, now!” Morgan shouted. She leapt from a rooftop behind him and soared through the breach. A pulse of blue flame swelled around her as she bounced from one rock to the next. She met an Apatten head on. She gripped it by the throat. Its flesh ignited around her fingers like kindling. As she thrust her hand forward, its head rolled the opposite direction. Morgan didn’t even bother to reach for the next one in front of her. She screamed, and the blue pulse exploded into an inferno in every direction. Every Apatten in front of, beside, and behind her met the same blistering fate.

  Morgan leapt past the apex of the rubble and continued her swath of flames at those Apatten approaching the wall. Garen saw the stones tumbling upward into formation and reattaching themselves. Her shout probably had not been intended for him, but he was no less qualified to sculpt debris back into a wall.

  Drake didn’t stick around to tear it back down. At the sight of Morgan, he moved his assault elsewhere. He flew low enough that some of the crossbowmen could fire on him. But like most of the Kalyx guard, they didn’t have the skill or experience in war to pose a threat. Drake didn’t even collapse the entire wall. He slanted the ridge at a steep angle. Most slid and dropped to the Apatten below.

  Bodies sprang back up and over the ridge. It stole Garen’s attention from rebuilding. They weren’t the crossbowmen being lifted back over. Apatten were being tossed by enormously powerful gusts of wind straight over the wall. The first twenty landed and engaged the guards. Garen left his section unfinished and light-shifted to them.

  Garen locked swords with one Apatten after another, purely defensive in nature. It kept them in step until he could put a focused flame into their chest or neck. A crossbowman from the wall took care of one for him, but the other few continued to fire rapidly into the sea of bodies outside. More Apatten were lifted, this time onto the wall itself. Garen saw how few of the men had the depth to defend themselves. The Apatten made quick ends of their screaming.

  Garen downed the last of the enemies when another dozen vaulted into the city. Before he could reach them, a second dozen followed. Helplessness broke against him again like a wave. The fury he felt still outweighed his despair, and he ran into yet another fray. Garen felt his depth nearing half-empty as he blasted them away. Garen let out an eruption of light to give himself space. The blinding stun only lasted a moment for the Apatten, but he sliced through another couple in the process. They charged him again, heads lowered and hands in front of their ey
es. Normal men had never been this brazen after experiencing that kind of trauma.

  Garen took advantage of their poor sight and form, but even their wild swings were numerous enough to force him backward. They fought in a field of grass between the estate behind him and the wall. If the Apatten passed him, the massacre would begin. For all he knew, it had already begun elsewhere. Would stopping these ones make any difference?

  The Apatten stopped advancing. Their guarded swings were replaced by flailing motions and helpless, unintelligible wails. Garen saw the thick ice that crept over their feet, pinning them in place. They stared at the trappings in a panic, unable to free themselves. One slashed at the ice with his sword, but Garen didn’t waste his moment of opportunity. Twelve fast steps and twelve piercing cuts ended their struggle.

  “Try to keep up,” Naia called from the top of the roof ahead of him. Garen light-shifted beside her on the angled metal roof and surveyed both directions. The stretch of wall behind him had mostly bordered large estates with open fields. The lawns were obsessively maintained, an idyllic green landscape now scattered in red. Ahead of him smaller shops and homes were built directly against the wall, most about half as tall. Naia headed that way, jumping from one roof to the next in Drake’s path.

  Another cluster of Apatten soldiers sprung over the wall with Drake’s help. The arc would have let them land in the narrow alley between two homes. He’d seen the creatures take the fall pretty hard on their feet, but they could handle the impact. This time Naia iced the patch. None stayed on their feet as they landed. Only a couple got back up. Garen paused to consider the best way to handle the survivors.

  “I said keep up,” Naia shouted. “They can handle a few loose ends below. We need to catch up to Drake.”

  Garen shifted into light ahead of her and matched her stride. “You forget, I can usually do both.” Naia was humorless in the moment. Garen still felt the tense distance between them.

  He heard screams below them. There were more Apatten than ‘a few loose ends.’ The battle was split between both sides of the wall now. “So, let’s pretend we can catch up with Drake,” Garen said. “Then what?”

  “Well,” Naia leapt with a touch of wind to cross the gap. Garen reserved his depth the best he could. He light-shifted the distance and waited for her to land before running alongside again. She continued, “Morgan and I didn’t have time to plan for psycho Drake.”

  “No, but we did. We have to give it a try.”

  Naia stopped entirely and faced him. “I can’t do anything that would help Drake. You know that.”

  “You have to try,” Garen said. “Your gate has the ability. I’ve seen it.”

  “So what if it does?” Naia shot back. “I don’t have time to practice while he’s leveling the city around us. If he keeps pushing soldiers through, everyone is dead before the sun sets.”

  Garen sighed in frustration. “Alright, maybe I can use the gate on my own. Maybe we don’t even need Ampelis.”

  Your kid’s an ass, Kallista. And he’s about to become Therov’s newest victim.

  Naia seemed confused but hopeful. It was a good thing she couldn’t hear the crass voice inside of her.

  “But I need to be closer,” Garen said, “preferably eye contact if I’m going to try it. I’ve tried finding Drake’s soul once before. When he lets Therov take the reins like this, he becomes something too distorted for me to find. That’s why I thought he was dead.”

  We both did, Kallista noted. I’ve never seen Therov exude that kind of influence. I do not think it is wise to confront him alone in Drake’s soul.

  Naia didn’t object. “Do you need him to sit still? I don’t think we can corner him.”

  “No, I’m the one who needs to be still. But once I’m in, distance shouldn’t matter. I just need a clean look.”

  You have no plan and no idea of how to stop him, Kallista warned.

  “Then I’ll have to think fast,” he whispered.

  Naia glanced back toward Drake, a mere speck in the sky at this distance. Another speck accompanied him. Flashes of red and orange flared from it. Garen peered closer. Morgan seemed to have reached the same conclusion they had. Stopping Drake was the best chance of protecting the city.

  “I think this might be your chance,” Naia said, watching the two draw nearer.

  Garen rolled his neck and felt the joints pop. “I can’t say I’m ready, but you’re right. Promise me you’ll watch my back while I’m in there.”

  “I don’t think you deserve anyone’s promises. But for Drake, I’ll keep you alive.”

  Garen stopped watching the warring Spellswords in the sky and turned to Naia in frustration. “Do you want to tell me where that hatred’s coming from?”

  “Oh, I will. But their lives come first. Get ready.”

  Garen shook his head, struggling to focus forward with the contempt radiating next to him. She was right. Drake’s life came first.

  Drake looked back over his shoulder as he flew, lifting Apatten over the wall and making sure he was a safe distance from the living flame spout behind him. He looked forward and saw Garen and Naia in his path. Drake’s eyes widened in surprise before he could look away. Garen appeared at the doorway to Drake’s mind and stepped through.

  Chapter 33

  Garen hadn’t entered Drake’s mind since freeing him at the Theltus Nisdal. At the time, all he could do was apply his own visual representations. Karna had taught him to use a person’s own state of mind to build the hallway. He remembered the organized feeling of Drake’s memories last time, but Garen had been the one to assign that. As he let Drake’s thoughts and emotions craft the space, what he found this time was anything but orderly.

  A maze stretched out in front of him. The walls were made of shelves twice his height. Each one held as many scrolls and bound tomes as Garen had ever seen. Ahead of him the shelves slid and ground against one another, constantly changing. Two shelves collided. Splinters of wood and shredded parchment rained down around them. Two other shelves slid apart to reveal an alcove. From inside, a young voice spoke.

  “Can you tell me another one?”

  A boy knelt by an elderly man on a floor cot. A second bed was laid alongside it. The room was richly decorated, and the boy wore a satin robe with a perfectly pressed collar. He’d seen it among some older Eastern nobility, but it had long since fallen out of fashion.

  The old man coughed and placed a trembling hand on the boy’s shoulder. “I think that’s all for tonight. Perhaps I’ll dream of more adventures with Nereus by the morning. Could I have a sip of water first?”

  Moments later a serving girl entered the room. As she approached the two, a guard stepped up and extended his spear in front of her. “Master Elic’s page will take it.” The girl seemed terrified, but nodded. A young Drake stood and retrieved the pitcher of water from her. He returned to the twin cots and poured it into a cup. He helped the elderly man press the cup to his lips.

  A shelf behind them rumbled, but no one turned to look. The bookcase crashed down on the memory, billowing up in a cloud. As the dust settled, the boy knelt once again over his elder and cried hysterically. There were more guards lining the room now, but all kept their distance. None moved to help or comfort the screaming boy.

  The shelves slid until a new hall emerged, covered in tattered pages. Garen moved with urgency down the path. He saw glimpses of the solitary life Drake had lived. The hours of study. The obligatory social attendance as a child and a teen. He was little more than a prop for his family. They marched him out as a parlor trick with his wind magic to impress their guests. They celebrated peace in high fashion and kept him confined to his chambers the rest of the time.

  A young Drake snuck through their estate late one night. He watched a woman screaming at the gates, demanding answers about her missing child. The guards ignored her until she waved her daughter’s hairclip in the air, telling them she’d found it nearby. They took the woman inside, and while Drake coul
d only watch from a distance, he never saw her leave.

  She wasn’t the last distraught parent to level accusations at the Geonode Guild. Others pleaded to the Kalyx guards for help finding their missing family members. Drake aged and began to ask questions. His family ignored him, and the guild denied them.

  Back in the halls of Drake’s mind, steel bars held two of the shelves in place. They formed a permanent gateway. Inside, a teenage Drake stood alone at his parents’ grave. Garen’s mind shivered as the icy air curled the loose pages around him. He kept moving through the maze.

  A memory of Drake meeting Micah lay ahead. There was a warm joy surrounding it unlike the others. Micah opened a door, motioning Drake inside the Spellswords’ hall of the palace for the first time. Before Drake could step past him, a shelf of books crashed down through the scene. The memory scattered like wisps of smoke. Shelves slid until the ever-changing maze directed Garen back to a memory within the walls of Kalyx.

  Drake followed Baron Ambersong closely. He took every opportunity to attend his family’s engagements, desperate to catch a glimpse of their underhanded dealings with the slave trade. The guild monitored Drake just as closely and made any attempt to spy impossible.

  Garen saw another memory forced open. The shelves surrounding it were braced upright by steel beams. No matter what slid and fell, this room stayed intact. Inside, Drake appeared as he did now, late twenties and wearing a modern green tunic and tailored brown trousers. Morgan stood with him in their old meeting room in Vikar-Tola. They spoke in hushed voices, her hand in his. She sighed and shrugged, sad and apprehensive. Garen couldn’t hear their conversation, but he saw Drake mouth two words. “It’s fine.”

  Everything shook around Garen. It was more than a single shelf falling in the distance. He decided to ask directly instead of observing. “Why are you stuck on these memories?”